The present invention relates to apparatus for processing wafers, crackers, saltines, pretzels, zwieback and other types of bakery products (hereinafter called biscuits) which are baked, dried or otherwise treated in an oven prior to further processing, especially packing. More particularly, the invention relates to improvements in apparatus for processing large quantities of biscuits between an oven and a means for confining biscuits in boxes, bags, packets or analogous containers. Still more particularly, the invention relates to apparatus for processing biscuits which issue, in large quantities, from an oven along two or more paths.
An oven for mass-production or treatment of biscuits is a bulky elongated aggregate which cannot be readily arrested and restarted. Thus, if the oven is directly coupled with a packing machine and the packing machine is arrested due to malfunction or for other reasons, the delivery of dough to the oven can be interrupted without delay; however, the contents of the oven must be processed so that the oven invariably discharges large quantities of biscuits subsequent to interruption of the admission of dough and while the packing machine is already idle. As a rule, the path between the outlet of the oven and the packing machine is observed by several attendants who must remove discrete biscuits or blocks of stacked biscuits (such blocks are normally provided with one or more wrappers of metallic foil, wax paper or the like) from the path along which the biscuits advance toward the idle packing machine. When the packing machine is restarted, the attendants shift the blocks of biscuits in the path to provide room for reinsertion of previously removed blocks and to thus avoid waste as well as to insure that the accumulations of removed blocks disappear prior to renewed deactivation of the packing machine.
As a rule, the packing machine is much more likely to be arrested than the oven and/or the devices which transport biscuits from the oven to the packing machine. The packing machine is designed to accept the entire output of a large oven, i.e., to confine in containers all such biscuits which issue from the oven and advance along several discrete paths each of which leads to the packing machine. The speed at which the biscuits issue from the oven is high so that the attendants must act quickly in order to insure removal of all biscuits or blocks of biscuits which issue from the oven subsequent to stoppage of the packing machine. This invariably entails damage to or destruction of a high percentage of biscuits. Furthermore, the cost of operation is very high because a number of attendants must be present at all times, regardless of whether or not the packing machine is running since they must be ready to proceed with removal of biscuits as soon as the speed of the packing machine is reduced or the packing machine comes to a full stop. Total deactivation of the entire apparatus (including the oven) is impractical because this would entail extremely high losses in output for obvious reasons, i.e., starting of a large industrial biscuit baking oven is a time-consuming procedure and large quantities of biscuits are wasted before the oven is again ready for normal operation. Therefore, the efficiency and reliability of the packing machine are those factors which exert maximum influence upon the output of the entire apparatus.